FORCED MARRIAGE, CEO'S LITTLE WIFE

Chapter Five

Sophia “What brought you here?” The stranger asks as he’s eyes on the skyline. “Tonight, I mean. You look like someone who doesn’t usually choose places like this. “I almost didn’t,” I admit “ I stayed home all day. My sister staged a gentle intervention. Said I need to let the world be kind to me for once. “Is it being kind?” He turns back to me. There’s a trace of something in his expression I can’t read. Curiosity? Concern? Amusement held on a short leash?“It’s… quiet,” I say. “On the inside that’s rare.”He holds my gaze a fraction too long for a conversation with a stranger. Heat rises across my chest, a slow tide. The room keeps humming. Far below, tire hisses through water. The song changes— a low patient bass line, the kind you feel along your skin before you hear it.We don’t talk for a moment. We just look at the same city. When his hands find the bar near mine, his knuckles brush my fingers. It’s nothing, and at the same time, it’s everything. The touch is light and intentional, and an electric translation of everything that has been suspended between us since he crossed the room floor. I don’t move my hand away. One drink becomes two, becomes tens unhooked from the wall. The bartender clears up space around us without intruding, and people become a backdrop: suits and sequins, laughter and camera flashes, all of it slightly out of focus. He tells me nothing about himself— no job title, no origin story, no last name. I volunteer nothing that could lead him to my door. It should make the moment feel thin, but it makes it feel sealed. The question doesn’t come as words. It arrives as a shift in air, a quiet decision housed in the way his shoulders tilt towards the exit and the way my pulse answers. When he stands, he doesn’t offer his hands. He offers a nod— an invitation with an escape route folded inside it. Don’t. Just this once. I follow him into the elevator, rain-slick sounds falling away as the door seals. We don’t speak as the car lifts. The city falls. My heart is filled with heat that reads as fear until I recognize it as something else: a relief at not needing language. The hallway is hushed, carpeted, and dimly lit. He opens a door with a key card, and the room beyond is simple and expensive: clean lines, a tall window, the city laid out like a secret he’s letting me borrow. The air smells like cedar and a salt note I can’t place. The room is dim but I can see his figure clearly. He moves close to me and I breathe him in. We stand a breath apart, looking at each other like a test neither of us is willing to fail. Then the distance disappears. Heat. Urgency. The sound of rain beating on the window mixed with the wet sounds of his tongue in mine. His hands find my hair as he uses it to angle my head to press his kisses deeper. I feel so plaint, so useless. Yet so good.With one hand in my hair and the other grabbing my ass, the stranger lifts me up and moves me to the bed. I land gently as the bed wobbles. Molten needs to be below my stomach. He dips his hand under my dress and pushes my underwear to the side. His cold fingers meet me hot and slick. I can’t help the moans I let out as he dips his finger inside me, just an inch. As if testing the waters before diving in. He continues like that, plunging in and out of me. Deeper and deeper, it continues until I’m a wet mess. He stops just in time before I come, and at this point, I resent him for it. He stands upright and bends slightly to the drawer by the bed and pulls out something silver. I don’t make a sound. I just watch as he takes off his clothing. The room is too dark for me to make out his figure, so I make use of the only thing I can. The sense of touch. I lift myself up, I’m a little under his weight. But he lets me. I trace his chest with my fingers, feeling his pectoral muscles and chest. I drag my hand down the V of his waist and I feel the tickle of hair. I drag my finger deeper until I finally feel him. He’s bigger than I’ve ever had before. I gently trace his length with the tips of my fingers, I feel him shudder. Both of us are breathing hard. He kisses me again, harder than before. He pulls back and wears the condom he pulled out that I totally forgot about. Not very responsible of me. We’ll fall back on the bed, him on me. He lifts my waist just enough to plunge into me. I let out a loud moan, but he cut me off with a kiss. His thrusts are long and hard. Nothing about it is careful. Nothing about it is cruel. It is the shortest path out of my head I have found in a long time. It doesn’t take long for the room to be filled with the sound of flesh slapping on flesh. And throughout, I don’t think about debt, dues. I just enjoyed three experiences. •••••After, the room is quieter than seems possible. The rain softens. The windows fog at the edges. He sets a glass of water on the nightstand and lies back in bed. I drink. He doesn’t ask questions and neither do I. The sheets hold our heat for a while, cooling in concentric rings. I focus on small things to keep me front thinking about the larger ones: the ticking thermostat, the faint hum of the minibar. At some point, his breathing slows and he falls into the cadence of sleep. I wait for a while to make sure he’s asleep then I slide out of bed with care. I gather the black dress and my shoes, and carry them to the bathroom. The mirror fogs and clears around my face. I swipe a line with my wrist and catch my own eyes— bright and alive. In a way that hurts to look at. I redress. I find my umbrella. I stand for a second by the window and look over the city. After a while, I walk out the door and tune back. Grateful for this stranger who made me forget all my burdens for a little while. I leave without asking his name.